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Sunday, 29 September 2013

"One broad principal of economy"; One female booking clerk in 1903

Whenever a railway company decided to employ a woman as a
clerk before 1914, the newspapers always described the event as an ‘experiment’
or an ‘innovation.’ The Caledonian Railway took such a step 1903 when it
decided to hire an unnamed woman as booking clerk at Perth Station. ‘RAILWAY INNOVATION
AT PERTH’ was the title of The Evening
Post’s report.[1]

In reality this was not an innovation. The Edinburgh,
Perth and Dundee Railway, which later became part of the North British Railway,
had employed a woman as a booking clerk a Perth Station in 1858.[2] Other
British railway companies were also employing large numbers of women in similar
positions on their networks by 1903. The Yorkshire
Evening Post reported that ‘the female booking clerk is no new thing in Glasgow;
there have been girl booking clerks in the West of Scotland for ten years.’[3] The Evening Post itself acknowledged how
the Caledonian’s new policy was not unique, ‘In the ticket office she may be
something of a novelty in the North, but not so further South. The London and North-Western
was already ahead in its employment of ladies on the ticket staffs.’[4]

In fact, the Caledonian’s appointment of 1903 was only a
unique because it was the first time it had dabbled with such an ‘experiment.’ The
plan was, it seems, to expand the number of female booking clerks on the
company’s network. In one officials’ view the ‘lady clerk was here to stay,’ with‘female labour in the service of the
pen…rapidly widening.[5]

As with all instances of women being employed as clerks there
was a large degree of doubt as to whether they had the skills or aptitude
to perform their roles adequately. A Caledonian official thought
that ‘it was not imperative that she should run up columns of figures or juggle
with statistical puzzles of periodical survey. Her usefulness could be
exploited without any apprehension of accounting difficulties.’[6] The Yorkshire Evening Post went one
further affirming that there were just some things that female booking clerks were
incapable of doing; ‘her sex unfits her for the country station, where the
booking clerk adds to his duties those of ticket collector.’[7] Whether this
was the view of railway companies’ managements is unclear.

If there was doubt amongst Caledonian officials that women could perform the role of booking clerk adequately, why then did they proceed with the 'experiment'? Let us not presume it was because a railway manager had a
particularly progressive or feminist outlook and wished to promote equal
opportunities in the workplace. Between 1897 and 1901 the Caledonian’s
operating ratio – its operating expenditure expressed as a proportion of
revenue – rose from 50.4% to 56.4%.[8] Such an increase in operating costs,
principally because of higher coal prices, affected most British railways in this
period and, like most companies, it is presumed that the Caledonian
enacted an immediate economy drive in response.

The employment of female booking clerks was therefore likely
part of this quest to reduce costs. The ‘official’ highlighted that
they were paid less than their male counterparts: ‘the salary for mere
ticket-selling would be somewhat under that of the regular male ticket clerk.
She was a commodity of cheapness and so long as she went into the clerical market
so long would she prove a mercantile rival on the railway as on any other
railway.’ He foresaw that the female booking clerk was a permanent fixture ‘so
long as one broad principal of economy rules the railway organisations of
today.’[9] Another benefit for the railway of employing female booking clerks was that they were
never moved from their position or were promoted. ‘The male booking clerk,’ The Yorkshire Evening Post contended, ‘is a
restless animal with a keen eye on promotion, and the only way to keep him in
the service is to change him from station to station…the girl clerk does
not leave her post until she marries.’ Because the women were never given the
opportunity to move from the position in which they were initially employed,
this reduced the cost for the railway company of finding and training a constant
stream of new male booking clerks.[10]

Overall, the Caledonian’s example has shown how important
it is to place the growing number of women employed on Britain’s railways after
1900 in context. In 1901 1,633 were working on Britain’s railways; by
1914 this number had risen to 13,046.[10] I would say that to a large extent
this growth was driven by British railway companies’ desire to cut costs, and not principally because individuals in authoritative positions in the industry that had progressive outlooks.

--------------------------

[1] Evening Post, 6 October 1903, p.2

[2] Wojtczak, Helena, Railwaywomen, (Hastings, 2006), p.27

[3] Yorkshire Evening Post , 12 October 1903, p.4

[4] Evening Post, 6
October 1903, p.2

[5] Evening Post, 6
October 1903, p.2

[6] Evening Post, 6
October 1903, p.2

[7] Yorkshire Evening Post , 12 October 1903, p.4

[8] Board of Trade, Railway Returns, 1897 and 1901

[9] Evening Post, 6
October 1903, p.2

[10] Wojtczak, Railwaywomen, p.4 – The first figure is
from the 1901 census returns and could be open to change. I feel personally
that it is a little low.

3 comments:

I think it’s easy to apply a 20thC metropolitan view on this. I worked for several years in the West of Scotland during the late 1970s. As a southerner I was acutely aware that women just didn’t do men’s jobs – not that they weren’t capable. Rather it was a family pride ‘thing’ men were expected to be the bread-winners and if a woman took a full-time job you were possibly preventing someone else being a bread-winner. Happy to do part-time work or night work (so you could be home when the kids came back from school).

With two, very notable exceptions – if you were a widow (especially if your late husband had died in service following an accident) or the prime carer for a retired employee then in my experience the railway bent over backwards to find suitable employment. Most frequently in a clerical role either in a booking office or an admin office there were any number of ‘clerkesses’

It is interesting to see the numbers of female employees on the LB&SCR system whose father was in a position of Station Master or Inspector.

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Hello! Welcome to TurnipRail, a blog about Britain's railway pasts. This blog has a number of aims. Firstly, I wish to spread my PhD research (on the management of the London and South Western Railway, 1870-1910) to beyond the university's confines, as well as discuss elements of railway history. Secondly, I hope that in the process I will entertain everyone, and lastly, I hope endeavour to promote myself as a writer of history.

On this site you will not find anything that can be called 'enthusiast material.' After all, that is more than well catered for on the web. Rather, this site will discuss aspects of Britain's railway from a social, economic, business and technological perspective.

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